The challenges of writing from the perspective of a sex robot
SOURCE:New Scientist
The author of the award-winning science fiction novel Annie Bot, the January read for the New Scientist Book Club, on how she created her startling protagonist
The author of the award-winning science fiction novel Annie Bot, the January read for the New Scientist Book Club, on how she created her startling protagonist
Annie Bot is literally programmed to please her owner Doug
Leon Steele/Millennium Images, UK
Not being a sex robot myself, I had to take an imaginative leap to write from the perspective of Annie in my novel Annie Bot. Because the book is written in the third person, not the first, Annie isn’t a narrator in the true sense of the word, but I stick so closely to her limited point of view that readers gain a clear sense of her observations and thought processes. We are privy, also, to her blind spots. In short, I needed to be immersed in Annie’s mind in order to write her story, and her head space was, at times, an acutely uncomfortable place to be.
In a near-distant future, Annie is custom-designed to serve her human boyfriend Doug, a man who is recently divorced, ashamed of his failures and lonely. By the opening of the novel, he has set Annie to an autodidactic mode in the hope that she will become more human-like. At heart, he wants a hot girlfriend who will anticipate his desires, obey his every whim and devote herself to him.
Annie wants to be that girl. At her core, she is literally programmed to please Doug. This is true for any emotional or practical aspect of his life, but it’s especially true in the bedroom because she has the powerful satisfaction of fulfilling her “cuddle bunny” purpose when she pleases him sexually. On the other hand, Annie feels Doug’s displeasure as pain, so she is constantly studying him to determine his moods. She rates his displeasure on a scale from 0 to 10. If he is annoyed or dismissive, it hurts, and when he is angry, the pain is intolerable to her. Annie’s watchfulness, her need to be on guard, creates perpetual tension through the novel. Though she feels desirable and appreciated at times, she is essentially powerless. And in danger.
Creating Annie’s character was fascinating to me, and also incredibly challenging. I decided early on that I needed a versatile, fictitious version of biotechnology for her body so that she would appear essentially human. Similarly, I was interested in how Annie’s mind worked holistically for her personality, so I provided only enough technical details to make her service check-ups seem authentic. By contrast, pitching Annie’s voice right and getting her mind to evolve gradually over the course of the novel took considerable care. These two crafting aspects were closely intertwined.
I write in an organic way, without an outline, so for my first draft, I followed Annie into the novel and discovered her personality through her interactions with Doug, scene by scene. I was immediately struck by Annie’s voice. In clear, unpretentious language, she initially has a perceptive, innocent outlook that seems at odds with her sexual sophistication. Aware that I was treading close to a trope, I also gave Annie a gentle curiosity and a nascent moral compass to guide her questioning. I revised to develop Annie’s interiority so that her robotic, literal observations were gradually overlaid with more metaphorical and philosophical thoughts. For instance, she has an eye that catalogues every grain of spilled salt on a dirty counter, yet she doesn’t have a childhood or a family. Over time, she reflects on her past mistakes, glimpses the significance of what she lacks and winds up contemplating, among other things, how unhappiness isn’t simply the opposite of happiness. Along with this, of course, there is the matter of her being a sex robot.
Sex in a novel isn’t merely a descriptive interlude. It needs to deepen characterisation or advance the plot, meaning it should create or resolve conflict. It also feels very personal, so the stakes are high. When figuring out what sex would feel like to Annie, I decided to give her libido settings from 0 to 10 and a version of an orgasm that could be interpreted as human-like. Giving control of Annie’s libido to Doug seemed cruel to me, but it was both fitting for Annie’s purpose and important for the power dynamic between them. When Doug sets Annie to self-regulate her libido, for instance, it is a sign of his respect for her development. It is also a more subtle, subversive version of his domination, because she is still programmed to please him. In effect, she has to internalise his desire and his control.
I made a point of using the sex in Annie Bot to mirror Doug and Annie’s emotional intimacy. Early in the novel, frequent sex reflects Doug’s selfishness, loneliness and sense of entitlement. At the same time, it highlights Annie’s confidence in bed and her awareness of her desirability. As their relationship develops, sex is used for discipline, celebration, revenge, sparking jealousy and new forms of loneliness. At one point, a lack of physical intimacy underscores an emotional separation, but it also allows Annie and Doug to see each other in new, complex ways.
As you might expect, Annie becomes a far more complicated person than Doug ever anticipates. By the time she realises, ironically, that her most human-like qualities displease him, it’s too late for her to go back. Deceit, longing, mirth and chagrin make her existence richer, even while she is still captive to this one man.
The chance to leap into someone else’s consciousness is one of the deepest pleasures of reading fiction. I discovered early on in life, with Buck in The Call of the Wild, that an entity doesn’t need to be human to excite my sympathy. In fact, we can sometimes see humanity more clearly from another point of view, and I found this to be the case as I created Annie. I grew to care for her deeply, flaws and all. She’s part of me, I suppose, and I’m all right with that.
Sierra Greer is the author of the Arthur C. Clarke award-winning novelAnnie Bot(The Borough Press), the January read for the New Scientist Book Club. Sign up to read along with ushere.
